Today is a delight. My sweatshirt is gone, replaced by my flannel shirt. It will be in the 60’s. Nala returned the lost garden glove from the yard. I found it on the floor this morning. She has already been a busy girl. I missed Gwen this morning. I didn’t go in when I saw her as it was too early for her shot. I was hoping she’d still be out when it was shot time, but I had to hunt for her under the beds. She was in front of one heating vent. I gave her a few treats and her insulin. I figure she and Jack are now under the beds for their morning naps. The dogs are out in the yard. All’s right with the world.

Yesterday Nala was glued to the front door. She wasn’t moving and was intently looking outside. I went to check. She was watching a spawn of Satan dine on one of my pumpkins. The insides of the pumpkin and some seeds were strewn on the walk. That spawn ignored the two of us and just kept eating. Cheeky beastie!

When I was a kid, there was no leash law. Dogs roamed. Duke, our boxer, was all over town. My favorite Duke story is the time he recognized my grandmother, who was shopping uptown, and followed her. He had stayed at her house a couple of times so he knew her. Duke followed my grandmother into Woolworth’s. He lifted his leg on the comic book display. The manager asked my grandmother if Duke was her dog. She said no, which was technically true, but then she lied and said she didn’t know him. The manager was skeptical as Duke was still there sitting beside her. She wasn’t called out on it even when he followed her out of the store and down the sidewalk. My grandmother said she was thoroughly embarrassed being questioned about Duke after his comic book escapade. I still laugh about this story.

When I think about comfort food, I think about my mother. Because my father was a meat and potato guy, we always expected mashed potatoes. I remember making a well in the middle of my potatoes, adding gravy and trying not to let the gravy overflow, just because it was challenging. My favorite mashed potatoes were the ones my mother used to frost her meatloaf, the king of comfort foods. Tomato soup with a grilled cheese sandwich is one of my favorite comfort combinations. My mother’s grilled cheese sandwiches were epic. I remember the browned bread from the cast iron skillet oozing with melted Velveeta. I’d dip it into my soup and be careful not to let it slop. I remember going inside after sledding and being warmed by thick tomato soup and a grilled cheese sandwich. I yummed my way through the entire meal.

Huzzah!! Huzzah!! I’m celebrating an accomplishment. Yesterday I did three loads of laundry. The last load, sheets, is still in the dryer, but everything else is put away upstairs. I even changed my bed. This morning I have already had my annual eye doctor’s exam, an 8:30 appointment. I don’t know what I was thinking. I set my alarm, my Alexa, but woke up before she said good morning.

When I went to get the papers, I was surprised how warm it is. Right now it is already 55˚, and without a wind, it feels almost tropical, only maybe not tropical, but it is warm.

When I was a kid, I would have rushed home on a day like today to play outside for awhile. Darkness came early this time of year, and we could only play outside until the street lights came on. I remember playing Red Rover. We’d call to the other team, and our voices sounded loud and seemed to echo in the twilight. Every kid got picked for a team. The strategy was, once called over, to run through the smallest kids as fast and as hard as you could. If you broke through that was how you added to your team. If you didn’t break through, you were now on the other team. The games was over when one team was down to its last man.

Red light, green light was another game we played. It was always controversial. When the caller yelled, “Green light,” we could move toward the caller, but if the caller yelled, “Red light,” we had to stop immediately. Whoever didn’t was out. That where the controversies took place. Kids would yell they hadn’t been moving, and both sides would argue. A lot of times, someone would get really mad and go off in huff. That’s when the game ended.

We had to stay close to home on those afternoons, within hearing distance. The mothers seemed to have plotted together or maybe there were rules only mothers knew because, at about the same time, all the mothers yelled out their front doors for us to come home. It was the front doors because we played in the street on those afternoons. Our back yards were too small. Back then we lived on a cul-de-sac with a tiny rotary. A fence ran around all the backyards so we preferred the street. My neighborhood was filled with kids so we always had somebody to play with every afternoon. I remember all of us running in different directions home. I also remember how warm the house felt and how wonderful supper smelled.